Thread by @kakape

"A year ago today, fewer than 1500 cases of #COVID19 had been reported to @WHO, including just 20 cases outside China”, says @DrTedros at WHO presser. "This week, we expect to reach 100 million reported cases.”

@WHO @DrTedros "Numbers can make us numb to what they represent: every death is someone’s parent, someone’s partner, someone’s child, someone’s friend”, says @drtedros. "Vaccines are giving us hope, which is why every life we lose now is even more tragic."

@WHO @DrTedros "Last week, I said that they will distribute on the brink of a catastrophic moral failure if it doesn't deliver equitable access to vaccines”, says @DrTedros. "Two new studies show that it wouldn't just be a moral failure. It would be an economic failure."

@WHO @DrTedros 1. Report from International Labour Organization found "decline in global labor income equivalent to $3.7. trillion” and recommended supporting low and middle-income countries in rolling out vaccines to help economic and employment recovery.
ilo.org/wcmsp5/groups/…

@WHO @DrTedros 2. Study commissioned by International Chamber of Commerce Research Foundation “finds that vaccine nationalism could cost the global economy, up to $9.2 trillion and almost half of that, $4.5 trillion, would be incurred in the wealthiest economies.”
iccwbo.org/media-wall/new…

@WHO @DrTedros “It is in every nation's own medium and long-term economic interests to support vaccine equity”, says @drtedros. "Until we end the pandemic everywhere, we won’t end it anywhere."

@WHO @DrTedros “As we speak, rich countries are rolling out vaccines, while the world’s least-developed countries watch and wait”, says @drtedros. "Every day that passes, the divide grows larger between the world's haves and have-nots."

@WHO @DrTedros Olympics Q: Should athletes be prioritised for vaccination?
The Games are “a wonderful symbol for our shared humanity”, says @DrMikeRyan. "However, we have to face the realities of what we face now: There is not enough vaccine right now to even serve those who are most at risk."

@WHO @DrTedros @DrMikeRyan "I don't believe we should start setting elimination or eradication of this virus as the bar for success”, says @DrMikeRyan. “The bar for success is reducing the capacity of this virus to kill, to put people in hospital, to destroy our economic and social lives."

@WHO @DrTedros @DrMikeRyan “We've only ever eradicated one disease on this planet, smallpox, and we're struggling against polio and we're struggling to eliminate measles”, says @DrMikeRyan (not counting rinderpest). "If we look to eradication as the measure of success, I think we're going to struggle."

@WHO @DrTedros @DrMikeRyan “If you're going to have a successful national vaccine action plan, you must involve the private sector”, says @ICCSecGen. “It's the genius of the innovation of the private sector, which will help on distribution, not just in developed countries but also in developing countries,"

@WHO @DrTedros @DrMikeRyan @ICCSecGen Current situation could lead to a managed trajectory of the pandemic in the North "but actually an unmanaged trajectory in the South”, says @ICCSecGen. There is "a compelling economic case, not just persuasive. to actually fully fund the COVAX facility."

@WHO @DrTedros @DrMikeRyan @ICCSecGen “The overall pattern in the Americas is beginning to stabilize”, says @DrMikeRyan. “The increases are not as as stark as they have been, but the health systems across the whole region are under pressure, and people like in the rest of the world are very very tired."

@WHO @DrTedros @DrMikeRyan @ICCSecGen Unlike Europe and other places the Americas never really had a period with low case numbers, @DrMikeRyan notes. ”The Americas and particularly Central and South America has had a punishing pandemic in terms of the persistence, and the relentless impact of the disease"

@WHO @DrTedros @DrMikeRyan @ICCSecGen “We are seeing reduced incidence in a number of countries that have different virus variants that have been identified: in South Africa, in the United Kingdom and Ireland and Denmark”, says @mvankerkhove "The control measures work."

@WHO @DrTedros @DrMikeRyan @ICCSecGen @mvankerkhove "We hope that all countries who wish to enhance their genetic sequencing capacity and contribute that data to the global knowledge will be able to do so”, says @drmikeryan. @WHO is "in a position to help connect them with the necessary technology and training to achieve that.”